Gov. Okezie Ikpeazu of Abia on Thursday in Abuja said Nigeria’s problem is not corruption, but lack of cohesion and unity among the people.
He said this at the public presentation of a book titled: “The Biochemistry of Environmental Pollution”, which he said was his contribution to the body of knowledge.
The book was jointly written by Ikpeazu and Kalu Kalu.
Kalu has a Ph.D. in Nutritional Biochemistry and Lexicology, he is a lecturer in the department of Veterinary Biochemistry and Animal Production in the College of Veterinary Medicine, Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, Umudike.
Ikpeazu obtained his Ph.D. in Pharmacological Biochemistry and Toxicology from the University of Calabar.
“The greatest problem of Nigeria today is not security, neither is it economic. It is a lack of cohesion. It is disunity. Our problem is mutual suspicion and lack of mutual respect,” Ikpeazu said.
He added that to build the country, we must come together irrespective of tribe and religion.
“We should see the country as belonging to all of us under one God,” the Abia state governor said.
Speaking on the aggrieved five Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) governors, otherwise known as G-5 governors, to which he belonged, Ikpeazu said the agitation of the governors was beyond 2023.
He said that it was all about inclusiveness and what the governors thought was at the root of the country’s challenge.
“If I come to a point in my life as a politician and you produce two or three critical officers of my party and they are all coming from one particular geo-political zone.
“I will agitate, even if they come from my geo-political zone, everybody has to be brought to the table.
“If you exclude Igbos from Northern Nigeria I will ask a question, I will also protest. If you exclude some people from Western Nigeria, I will still protest. For me, it is about including everybody.
“The youth, the women, people from the North and South, all of us, we need to do social mobilization in order for us to solve the economic problems of this country,” he said.
In the new book, Ikpeazu said the essence was to solve problems, adding that his study and sojourn in the area of biochemistry would be in vain, ”if I could not contribute to the body of knowledge”.
“It is this drive that propelled me to keep at it till I achieved it. When I came over to the flip side of public service, to serve as governor, I thought that would have been a point of divergence and disconnection from my first love – Biochemistry.
“But each time, I look at every issue, and every problem from the perspective of biochemistry,” the governor said.
He recalled that in 2013 when he had the opportunity to serve as the Deputy General Manager, Abia State Environmental Protection Agency, he saw the dimension of biochemistry.
This, he said, was especially in terms of trying to explain the causes and the diseases and the derailment we suffer every day because of the pollutants in the environment.
“Biochemistry refuses to leave me and I had to go back and pick it up. I feel very fulfilled because this is a journey I started over 20 years ago, it is not easy at all,” Ikpeazu said.
He added that writing a book on biochemistry did not leave him with too much choice, because there were rules and principles which must be reflected in interventions.
He said for him, it was the icing on the cake, adding that as an academic, he felt fulfilled and happy writing the book.
